


be my valentine (or whatever)

by dollsome



Category: Gilmore Girls
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-15
Updated: 2020-02-15
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:48:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22727158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dollsome/pseuds/dollsome
Summary: Rory receives a very unexpected valentine. Set in season two.
Relationships: Paris Geller/Rory Gilmore
Comments: 32
Kudos: 261





	be my valentine (or whatever)

**Author's Note:**

> Another Valentine's Day prompt, this one "Rory/Paris + 'Only You'" from imunbreakabledude on Tumblr. :)
> 
> Let us time travel back to season two, the greatest of times, for this tale!

Rory has known Paris Geller for over a year now—the hallways and classrooms of Chilton always push them together even when they’d much rather stay apart—and whenever she thinks she’s finally starting to figure that girl out, the universe gives her another chance to realize how wrong she is.

For example:

At the end of school on Valentine’s Day, Rory is too busy thinking about her plans with Dean tonight to pay attention to the routine process that is opening her locker. She hopes that having some time to be sappy fools in love together will get rid of the weird tension that’s been surfacing between them since Jess came to Stars Hollow.

When she pulls her locker door open, a red envelope falls out.

She bends down and retrieves it, baffled. There’s not exactly anyone who would want to send her valentines at Chilton—not even as a weird, mean joke, now that Tristan’s gone.

She checks to see that no one who would bug her about it is in the hallway (she so doesn't want to hear what Madeline and Louise would have to say), then opens the envelope and pulls out …

Whoa.

It’s a valentine, but not the kind you buy in a box and give to all your classmates in elementary school. It reminds Rory more of the opulent cards that her grandparents sent every year when she was little, but even those—fancy though they were—weren’t homemade, and she’s pretty sure this one is.

It’s all red and gold, covered in cut-out hearts and lace and fake (God, they have to be fake, right?) pearls, sort of a Moulin Rouge meets old timey love letters energy. It's a way more beautiful sight than her eyes had been prepared for.

Rory opens the card.

Familiar handwriting reads:

_Thanks for being nicer than you need to._

_Your friend or whatever,_

_Paris_

_p.s. This doesn’t mean I’m going to go easy on you, academically speaking. I will crush you. Happy Valentine’s Day._

Rory laughs to herself and, after admiring it for a minute more, tucks the card into her backpack. She’s careful to make sure it doesn’t get bent by her textbooks.

+

“Ooh, Dean went all out this year,” Lorelai says that night, admiring the card on Rory’s desk.

Rory, all pajama’d up and ready to catch some zzz’s after a blessedly drama-free night with her boyfriend, looks up from her book. “No, that’s actually from—"

“Paris?” Lorelai reads.

“Yeah.”

“Paris? _The_ Paris?”

“The one and only.”

“I thought that we’d reached the limit of psychological warfare with that one. Turns out the depths get deeper and more disturbing. And … God, there’s no way these can be real pearls glued on here, is there?”

“I think she was just being nice,” Rory says while Lorelai examines the card like she’s trying to find secret Satanic messages.

“Paris? _The_ Paris?”

“I think we might be friends,” Rory adds, feeling a little flutter of weird happiness at the thought. When she’d started at Chilton, she never would have imagined friendship with Paris having any appeal. But now that she’s gotten to know her better, well, it feels kind of nice. Strange, but nice.

Lorelai shrugs. “Well, if anyone can befriend anyone, even the little hellion who makes my mother seem fun and fancy-free, it’s you. But sleep with one eye open.”

“Will do,” Rory promises.

“And if this card tries to eat you in the night, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“Consider me warned.”

“And if it randomly opens a portal to a dark dimension, no need to wake me up—I don’t want to go with you. Luke promised me some _very_ great bargains on all the leftover Valentine’s Day pie tomorrow morning, and I can’t miss out on that just to save my firstborn from hell.”

“Got it. You done yet?”

“A ha ha, _please_. And hey, if the card sprouts little legs and wanders into the kitchen in the middle of the night and grabs a knife and then walks on its itty-bitty homicidal card legs back into your room to _stab you_ , don’t come crying to me …”

+

Rory, miraculously, survives the night with the valentine from Paris in her room.

“Thanks for the card,” she tells Paris the next morning at school, catching her in the wave of students walking inside.

Paris quickens her pace, like a silent dare for Rory to keep up. Rory does. “Don’t take it personally. I read that arts and crafts can help lower your stress levels, so I decided to give it a try. And you’re the only one at this school I could think of who wouldn’t throw themselves out the nearest window if they got a card from me. That’s all.”

“Still. It was really pretty.”

“Valentines are supposed to be really pretty, Rory. I’m not going to half-ass it just because it’s the stupidest holiday known to man.”

“From you, Paris,” says Rory, “I wouldn’t expect anything less.” She reaches into her pocket. “Here.”

Paris stares down at the little box of candy hearts that Rory got at Doose’s this morning. They were half-off, so she splurged on a red bow to stick on the front of the box. It’s a little crumpled from her pocket, but Rory likes to think the festive effect still comes through.

“Happy Valentine’s Day to you too, friend,” Rory says, and decides to quit while she’s ahead (for now). There’s nothing like a cool exit.

“You read the part in the card about how I’m going to crush you, right?” Paris calls after her as Rory continues down the hall.

Rory grins to herself and keeps walking.

(Well, okay, she sneaks a glance over her shoulder a few seconds later to find Paris smiling slightly at the box of candy hearts. If that isn’t a miracle that justifies the existence of the stupidest holiday known to man, then Rory doesn’t know what is.)


End file.
